SOTA Staff

Fund Allocation Process

The Allocations Process is the primary means for Friends of SOTA to provide funding to SOTA Staff to support activities that benefit SOTA students. Our mission is to provide support where a gap in available funding exists, so we are a funder of last resort. This means that we step in with funding when there is not RCSD District funding or other sources of funding available, or when the costs to individual students would otherwise be unreasonable for students and families to bear. The Friends Allocation Policy is available here.

Funding is requested via a Friends Allocation Funding Request (click here to access form). To ensure that District funding or other funding is not already available, all Allocation Requests are first sent to the SOTA Principal for review prior to being funneled by the principal to the Friends of SOTA Allocation Committee. Only SOTA Staff may make allocation requests. If an individual student or a student club requires funding, the student(s) should request a counselor or other staff person make a request on their behalf.

If you have questions about the Allocations Process or wish to discuss an allocation request, feel free to contact our Allocations Chairperson at info@friendsofsota.org. Please use the words “Allocation” somewhere in the subject line.

All funding requests are evaluated by the Allocation Committee, taking into account the total amount requested, the number of students that would benefit, and the degree of benefit per student. We strive to maximize the benefit to SOTA students, and we also try to say YES to as many requests as possible! Depending on the state of Friends of SOTA finances, the amount of the request, the degree to which the request benefits students, and other outstanding requests and prior commitments that have been made, we are sometimes only able to partially fund a request or (rarely) have to decline a request. However, we try to work with requestors to enable enriching activities as often as possible.

Friends of SOTA is an all-volunteer organization, and it can be difficult to get the committee together on an ad hoc basis for requests with a short lead time. Consequently, we evaluate allocation requests during regularly scheduled monthly committee meetings. We encourage you to submit your request as early as possible, and require allocation requests at least a month in advance of when you need the check. To speed the process, we require requestors who are making high dollar allocation requests ($500 or more) to attend the monthly allocations meeting (meeting schedule) where the request will be discussed to provide additional details as needed.

As a condition for receiving funding, we ask that requestors provide feedback to Friends on the outcome of the activity using the Allocations/Activity feedback form. A summary of how the event went, pictures (if available), student feedback or other information that lets us know what students got out of the activity is rewarding to us, and provides us with great, personalized impact information that is essential to effective fundraising for Friends to continue to provide a high level of financial support.